At home, I recently switched out my older DirecTV TiVo PVR for the newer version that has MPEG-4 decoding with the additional satellites that transmit more HD channels.

Included in these are the local channels in the San Francisco Bay Area.

So, we began watching local programming in HD, which includes the evening news.

I noticed the usual things, such as the pancake makeup on the news anchors, and I thought I might be caught up in paying attention to all the additional detail that was being shown in the live shots on the scene of news making events.

But, no, it appears that finally, for me at least, HD is just not the jaw dropping visual stimulus it used to be. I actually was paying more attention to the content.

And, it was still just as bad as it was in standard definition (SD), NTSC, 4:3.

I didn’t care that I could see more scratches in the crumpled metal of automobile accidents. I didn’t care that I could read the numbers of the stock market report or the numbers of victims in suicide bombings more easily.

The news stinks just as bad in high definition.

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on Friday, February 22nd, 2008 at 9:15 am and is filed under Industry News.
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One Response to “Daily Blog – John E. Johnson, Jr. – February 22, 2008: THE NEWS IN HIGH DEFINITION IS STILL BAD.”

Ironically, news broadcasts (and other “live” shows captured with HD cameras) look BETTER than a lot of other HD programming. But content, ultimately, is king. So while a couple of local Montreal news readers look even hotter, the news they report is not any more interesting or better. On that I agree with you.